Partnership Targeting Lead Poisoning in North Carolina Wins EPA Award for Environmental Justice
A Duke University-led community partnership that is helping reduce the risk of lead poisoning among children in North Carolina received a 2008 National Achievement in Environmental Justice Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The award cited the Children’s Environmental Health Initiative (CEHI) at Duke’s Nicholas School for its work since 2002 to promote early intervention strategies to prevent lead poisoning, particularly its efforts to develop and distribute a new mapping tool that public health agencies and community advocates can use to identify households where children are most at risk.
The tool, called the Childhood Lead Exposure Risk Model, uses advanced spatial and statistical analysis of data from county tax records, the U.S. Census, and blood lead screening tests to create secure, Web-based maps that predict lead exposure risk levels on a house-by-house scale. It allows local health departments to enter new data, search maps, and create reports according to specific local criteria. Health officials can even cross-reference high-risk housing with lists of Medicaid and WIC recipients, enabling them to comply with state lead testing mandates and protect these especially vulnerable children.
The model is available for use in 43 North Carolina counties and about a dozen other sites nationwide, including Detroit, Mich., and Kenosha County, Wis. In Durham County, where it has been used since 2002, it has led to a 600 percent increase in the early identification of homes with children with elevated blood-lead levels.
“Lead poisoning remains the foremost environmental health threat to children in the United States,” says Marie Lynn Miranda, CEHI director and associate professor of environmental science. “It affects children of all races and socioeconomic levels; however, low-income and minority children are at particular risk.
“The model we’ve developed gives public health officials information they can use to prioritize their limited resources, identify the homes with the highest exposure risks, and intervene before children become sick,” she says.
The EPA award also recognizes Miranda and her team for their ongoing public education and outreach.
CEHI partners include the North Carolina Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program; the Durham Affordable Housing Coalition; the Durham People’s Alliance; the Durham Department of Water Management; the Durham Department of Neighborhood Improvement Services; the Partnership Effort for the Advancement of Children’s Health; and the Durham County Health Department.
